It has been discovered that polarized inert noble gases can produce improved MRI images of certain areas and regions of the body that have heretofore produced less than satisfactory images in this modality. Polarized helium-3 (“3He”) and xenon-129 (“129Xe”) have been found to be particularly suited for this purpose. Unfortunately, as will be discussed further below, the polarized state of the gases is sensitive to handling and environmental conditions and can, undesirably, decay from the polarized state relatively quickly.
Hyperpolarizers are used to produce and accumulate polarized noble gases. Hyperpolarizes artificially enhance the polarization of certain noble gas nuclei (such as 129Xe or 3He) over the natural or equilibrium levels, i.e., the Boltzmann polarization. Such an increase is desirable because it enhances and increases the MRI signal intensity, allowing physicians to obtain better images of the substance in the body. See U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,545,396; 5,642,625; 5,809,801; 6,079,213, and 6,295,834; the disclosures of these patents are hereby incorporated by reference herein as if recited in full herein.
In order to produce the hyperpolarized gas, the noble gas is typically blended with optically pumped alkali metal vapors such as rubidium (“Rb”). These optically pumped metal vapors collide with the nuclei of the noble gas and hyperpolarize the noble gas through a phenomenon known as “spin-exchange.” The “optical pumping” of the alkali metal vapor is produced by irradiating the alkali-metal vapor with circularly polarized light at the wavelength of the first principal resonance for the alkali metal (e.g., 795 nm for Rb). Generally stated, the ground state atoms become excited, then subsequently decay back to the ground state. Under a modest magnetic field (10 Gauss), the cycling of atoms between the ground and excited states can yield nearly 100% polarization of the atoms in a few microseconds. This polarization is generally carried by the lone valence electron characteristics of the alkali metal. In the presence of non-zero nuclear spin noble gases, the alkali-metal vapor atoms can collide with the noble gas atoms in a manner in which the polarization of the valence electrons is transferred to the noble-gas nuclei through a mutual spin flip “spin-exchange.”
Generally stated, as noted above, conventional hyperpolarizers include an optical pumping chamber held in an oven and in communication with a laser source that is configured and oriented to transmit circularly polarized light into the optical pumping chamber during operation. The hyperpolarizers may also monitor the polarization level achieved at the polarization transfer process point, i.e., at the optical cell or optical pumping chamber. In order to do so, typically a small “surface” NMR coil is positioned adjacent the optical pumping chamber to excite and detect the gas therein and thus monitor the level of polarization of the gas during the polarization-transfer process. See U.S. Pat. No. 6,295,834 for further description of polarization monitoring systems for optical pumping cells and polarizers.
In any event, it is now known that on-board hyperpolarizer monitoring equipment no longer requires high-field NMR equipment, but instead can use low-field detection techniques to perform polarization monitoring for the optical cell at much lower field strengths (e.g., 1-100G) than conventional high-field NMR techniques. This lower field strength allows correspondingly lower detection equipment operating frequencies, such as 1-400 kHz. More recently, Saam et al. has proposed a low-frequency NMR circuit expressly for the on-board detection of polarization levels for hyperpolarized 3He at the optical chamber or cell inside the temperature-regulated oven that encloses the cell. See Saam et al., Low Frequency NMR Polarimeter for Hyperpolarized Gases, Jnl. of Magnetic Resonance 134, 67-71 (1998). Others have used low-field NMR apparatus for on-board polarization measurement.
After the spin-exchange has been completed, the hyperpolarized gas is typically separated from the alkali metal prior to introduction into a patient (to form a non-toxic pharmaceutically acceptable product). Unfortunately, both during and after collection, the hyperpolarized gas can deteriorate or decay relatively quickly (lose its hyperpolarized state) and therefore must be handled, collected, transported, and stored carefully. Thus, handling of the hyperpolarized gases is critical, because of the sensitivity of the hyperpolarized state to environmental and handling factors and the potential for undesirable decay of the gas from its hyperpolarized state.
As demand for the polarized gas increases, there is a need for methods and systems that can provide increased volume production of the polarized gas to meet production demands in a manner that provides a reliable supply of polarized gas in a relatively economic manner that can consider and facilitate hospital or clinical scheduling of associated equipment (MRI or NMR systems).